


This is How the Story Goes

by NonchalantxFish



Category: Original Work
Genre: Adopted Sibling Relationship, Angst with a Happy Ending, Brothers, Drabble, Druids, Fairytale Legend, Gen, Heroes, Insanity, Magic, Magic-Users, Magical Orders, One Shot, Original Character Death(s), Original Fiction, Overpowered Mages, Prophecy, Snippets, Strings of Fate, Sword Sages, War, fairytale, legend, tyrants
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-13
Updated: 2017-11-13
Packaged: 2019-02-01 17:36:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,104
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12709689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NonchalantxFish/pseuds/NonchalantxFish
Summary: .It starts with "Once upon a time" and stops after "The end", as these stories are wont to do..





	This is How the Story Goes

**Author's Note:**

> Wrote this for a creative writing workshop and liked it so much, that I decided to post it here. Tell me how you feel, yeah?

 

 

**_I. Once Upon a Time_ **

 

There is a man. He shows talent in magic, so he becomes a mage. He shows talent in leadership, so he becomes a king. But he wants more – so much more – so he amasses power. He usurps kingdoms and enslaves city-states, devouring land and resources. The people bow down to him, trembling as they do. No one dares to whisper, fearful of his spies that serve as his eyes and ears, of his magic that is hung around the world like a sickening veil.

Those who resist are slaughtered. Those who are spared are made into his undead army, his rotted hands that reach across the land and defile beautiful things with blood and shadow.

His name is Fehl’kai ac Zur, and he is a mage-king who wants to be a god.

And the world trembles before him.

 

 

**_**_II. There Is Little Hope_ ** _ **

 

But it is still hope. One of the last of her mage Order, which had been ravaged by Lord Zur’s thirst for power, a single Prophesier stumbles into one of the last strongholds of the free world. It is the stone metropolis of Serenvaard that hears her voice, all laced with magic:

> _“The year after next, a boy-child shall be born,_
> 
> _And within that year, so too, another unsung._
> 
> _He shall be abandoned by all but that unsung Yuusha,_
> 
> _He, Sword Sage, shall rise to greatness_
> 
> _On the blood of the tyrant Fehl’kai ac Zur,_
> 
> _And you shall know him for the stars on his back,_
> 
> _And a night sky’s moon by his side.”_

The Prophesier drops dead after her procalamation, but the world knows that the mage who wants to be a god would die. The lord of nightmares, the necromancer god-king, the incarntation of evil and chaos – Fehl’kai ac Zur is going to be destroyed, and the world freed.

Thus the Order of the Sages rises to leadership above all other mage Orders, searching for a boy-child that they would train to kill the creature of nightmares that haunted all the continent’s dreams.

 

 

**_**_III. It is a Word That Means “Hero”_ ** _ **

 

Yuusha.

His name is Fallon sai Mi-sha, and he was born with twelve birthmarks on his back, in the exact shape of the constellation named for ancient Yuusha, Sai-hee. He looks very much like a hero would: a soft, heart-shaped face and kind, blue eyes. His hair is like gold and he smiles like sunlight. Fallon sai Mi-sha will be beautiful one day.

They know it is him because he was abandoned by every member of his family at one point or another, and only another orphanage rat stands by him. They know it is him because of the stars on his back and that boy that stands before him, arms spread wide to shield the blue-eyed boy from their sight. That orphanage rat’s name is Naz’ras Shaa, a dark-haired and dark-skinned child with eyes so silver they look like twin moons set in his face.

They know, the Order and the world besides, that they have found their children of prophecy, their heroes, their Yuusha:

Yuusha Fallon, who would cut the tyrant down.

Yuusha Naz’ras, who would be unsung.

 

 

**_**_IV. They Are the Sun And the Moon_ ** _ **

 

Like day and night. Fallon sai Mi-sha, the boy with the stars on his back, is gentle-mannered and kind-eyed. His nature is truly like a sun, pulling others to gravitate around him. He smiles like there is nothing bad in the world, and coaxes nature to his whims with just a thought. He will often grow flowers in his bed, when the orphanage matron thinks he is sleeping, and he will weave them into beautiful half-crowns of blue and black and silver.

It is Naz’ras Shaa who wears them in the morning, his expression daring others to speak ill of his self-proclaimed brother’s gift. It is Naz’ras who flies at the Sages as they lay claim to Fallon, who tries to rip out their throats with his teeth. His nature is like a moon, pretty and cold, and the harbringer of the violent shadows of the night.

The Sages know, looking at the beast of a boy with moon-like eyes and the radiant child who controls him, that they will be great.

 

 

**_**_V. They Can Only Speak By Moonlight_ ** _ **

 

Because their days are filled with training and learning and sparring and hurt. The Sages demand so much more than they can give, demand perfection, demand salvation. The two boys are only seven years old, and their bodies ache.

“I don’t want to be a hero, Naz,” whispers the child with the stars on his back, “I’m scared.”

“We’ll get through this,” says the boy with silver eyes, “We’ll kill Zur, and then you won’t have to be scared anymore. Then we can be happy. Right, Fen?”

“I _was_ happy. Then the Order saw the birthmarks on my back and thought they looked liked Yuusha Sai-hee’s constellation.”

Sometimes the stars are not so pretty, to the little Yuusha Fallon, to the even littler Fen. He liked them, once. Naz’ras Shaa knows this, and can only smile tightly – his teeth no longer snap at Sage’s throats, sharpness ground down in frustration – and try to offer what little such an unsung can:

“We just have to kill Zur,” says Naz’ras Shaa, coaxing hope into his brother, “Then we can go back. We’ll be happy.”

 

 

**_**_VI. He Does Not Grow Flowers Anymore_ ** _ **

 

Instead, Yuusha Fallon’s magic crafts swords and daggers out of nothing and everything. He knows how to kill someone in an infinite amount of ways with just the flick of his fingers, with just a projection of his thoughts. Fallon sai Mi-sha is a Sword Sage now, and his blade points towards the tyrant’s Crimson Mountains.

Naz’ras Shaa does not grow flowers either. But his magic sinks into the earth and the animals, and he uses the fangs of spirit wolves and weasels to tear out enemy throats. They said Druid magic – ‘pansy flower magic,’ some sneered – would be useless in war, so the moon-boy becomes one to spite them.

He has not forgiven them for making a soldier of his gentle little brother. He never will.

 

 

**_**_VII. Chips of Ice_ ** _ **

 

That’s what they say of Yuusha Fallon’s eyes now. He is a Grandmaster of his Order, and commands an army of mages – hundreds of Orders, thousands of magicians that look to him as their leader – that slowly shave away at Zur’s forces. Spies and traitors are discovered and destroyed, undead herds set ablaze, dead lands uprooted and made fertile again.

They keep a count of how many they kill in each battle, goading each other with grins and smiles. It is Naz’ras Shaa who always wins. Yuusha Fallon is too indispensable, and retires from battle as soon as his injuries are too much. It is Naz’ras Shaa who dives behind enemy lines and disintegrates them with magic, unflinching even when wounds cover him from head to toe.

Once, Yuusha Fallon protested. But Naz’ras is walking destruction, even being a Druid – he has done things with Druid magic that are unimaginable, so bloody that his own Order is leery of his grotesque works – and the Yuusha cannot deny him his massacre when the results are so much more important.

 

 

**_**_VIII. That is Not to Say They No Longer Care for Each Other_ ** _ **

 

They do.

Yuusha Fallon stands over his most trusted friend, his brother, and trembles. There is no one to watch, no one to listen, but he does not weep. He has not wept since he was seven, curled up in patches of moonlight and thin blankets.

“You shouldn’t have taken those spells in my place, Naz’ras.” He says, voice shaking.

The moon-eyed man shakes his head. “I should have, and everyone knows it.”

This is the first law of the mage militia: _Yuusha Fallon is protected at all costs, including the lives of others._

“I never wanted you to sacrifice yourself for me. Your back is covered in scars now.”

This is the first law that Fallon tried to dissolve. He does not succeed, and there are mountains of dead who have acted in following it. Happily, even.

Naz’ras Shaa smiles, and it is a rare expression. So are the flowers crowning his head, black and silver and blue. A token comfort, but a comfort nonetheless.

“We’re the same, brother,” says the Druid, “Don’t the scars somewhat look like stars on my back?”

 

 

**_**_IX. They Gather Twelve Companions_ ** _ **

 

They are people with outstanding magical capabilities, the brightest of their Orders, people both Yuushas trust. They are the officers of their military, the friends they drink with on cold and dark nights, those they turn to when they ache in mind and body.

Three of the Order of Healers, keeping their bodies moving, fighting, conquering. One of the Order of Druids, hiding their armies in the great forests of the world. One of the Order of Sages, leading the warriors forward. Four of the Order of Summoners, supporting their soldiers with beasts of legend. And three of the Order of Warlocks, raining Zur’s monstrosities with the elements, relentless as the storms they create.

With them, the city-state Serenvaard amasses enough territory to become a capital. Fourteen hands, bloodstained and weary, had somehow created a country of free men.

 

 

**_**_X. They Lose Nine_ ** _ **

 

Only three remain of their officers. The Druid Seva, because Naz’ras Shaa is at her side before Zur’s army can take her during an ambush in the night. The Healers Kain and Fror, because they do not fight on the front lines. The others have disappeared, one by one, over the course of the war, leaving nothing but tears and stone graves.

“They gave their lives for our country.” Says the man with silver eyes dutifully.

They have just finished the ninth funeral. The world watched as Yuusha Fallon buried his fiancée’s brother that morning, holding her – Estranae, sister to Summoner Vesperae  – as she sobbed. The public funeral saw, as they have seen over the many funerals, that the only ones with dry eyes are Yuusha Fallon and Naz’ras Shaa.

“They gave their lives for their Yuusha.” Spits the man who would kill the tyrant.

“You know that long ago, those things became the same thing.”

 

 

**_**_XI. It is the Beginning of the End_ ** _ **

 

He is so close. The death of Fehl’kai ac Zur will free him. Yuusha Fallon rushes to it, hating the tyrant for more than the war he’s waged, for more than the friends he’s buried tearlessly. The tyrant has trapped him in this endless war, this endless cycle of loss, this role of Yuusha and Sword Sage and General.

Naz’ras sees his impatience. They call him the Spearhead of Serenvaard; it is Naz’ras who carves out bloody paths for Fallon’s armies, tracing a path to pierce Fehl’kai ac Zur’s dark heart.

 

 

**_**_XII. And Then It is the End_ ** _ **

 

It proceeds as dramatically as prophecies often do. While the last three officers lead the armies against the strongest of Zur’s forces – the Battle of the Nine, it’s called, for the officers scream the names of the nine dead as they bleed Zur’s forces – Naz’ras Shaa and Fallon sai Mi-sha head to Fehl’kai ac Zur. The two brothers will fight against Zur together, as they have always fought together, and they have long accepted that only one of them will be sung into the histories of the world.

They just want him dead, so they can be free.

 

 

**_**_XIII. He Rushes from the Ruins_ ** _ **

 

Naz’ras will reflect on the final duel later. He is too busy carrying Fallon from the Crimson Mountains, his right arm mangled beyond recognition and his legs cracked in several places. The marks on Naz’ras Shaa’s back, twisted and fleshy stars, run red with his brother’s blood. Yuusha Fallon destroyed Zur, but the final, violent blast of magic rendered his already broken, aching body unconscious.

Busy as he is, Naz’ras Shaa cannot help but smile.

He does not mind war and leadership and blood. In truth, it was Naz’ras who had always been more suited to becoming the Sage – bloodthirster, throat-tearer, spearhead – and Fallon to become the Druid. He has never minded war.

But his brother has, and so he grieved with him. And now, Fallon will finally, _finally_ be free.

 

 

**_**_XIV. Twice Upon a Time_ ** _ **

 

There is a man. He is beautiful, with golden hair and blue eyes. He can coax nature to his whims even without Druid training. He whispers to the caterpillar cocoon behind the cottage he lives in, grinning as she answers. She will be beautiful, he knows. She is beautiful, he knows that, too. Time is muddled for him, sometimes. He sees flashes of everything, of colors, of perceptions.

He wishes he were a caterpillar. She metamorphoses, wrapping herself in thread to become something better and new. Not broken, like him. He knows he’s broken. He doesn’t remember why.

His name is Fallon sai Mi-sha, and he is a Yuusha who has been driven insane.

And everyone who knows him, and even those who don’t, grieve for him.

 

 

**_**_XV. But No One Grieves More Than the Man With Moons in His Eyes_ ** _ **

 

The man who used to be Yuusha Fallon sees threads everywhere, of all colors, growing from people’s hearts, their ends tied around objects they love and the wrists of their most precious people. He sees he has many threads around his wrist, but they are broken and loose. There are people who loved him who are dead now, that’s what this means. But there is one, a silvery thread that winds around his arm, that is both stronger and more fragile than all others he’s seen.

It belongs to Naz, or so he calls Naz’ras Shaa. He cannot remember what he used to call him.

He cannot remember many things, before the Bad Man’s Dark.

“You’re all blue. Isn’t that painful for you? Your strings are all frayed. You should be careful you don’t stumble. They used to be very beautiful, even if they were all covered in blood. Maybe you should be a caterpillar, too.” He tells the man.

The man turns away.

His words don’t work. He wishes they did.

 

 

**_**_XVI. There is a Stranger Wearing His Brother’s Face_ ** _ **

 

He cannot call this crazed child Fallon. He calls him Fen, as the wrongness of the name is lessened with how long ago Fallon had abandoned those affections. Fen is peering at his empty right sleeve, squinting in concentration.

“Where did all your strings go?” Fen asks, blue eyes impossibly wide.

Naz’ras is bewildered. He often is, now. “Strings?”

Fen shakes his head, his attention on Naz’ras’ lack of right arm spent.

Naz’ras Shaa watches Fen run about barefoot and collect broken sticks and dull stones with triumphant grins. The Healers of their officers, Kain and Fror, also live here, in this isolated compoud miles outside of Serenvaard; they are working on a way to salvage Fallon from this stranger. It is Naz’ras’s duty to watch over him, when he is not fighting political battles and rebuilding in the city, and it pains him.

When Fen cuts his foot on sharp rocks, Naz’ras is reminded of when Fallon had twelve ambushers poised behind him. Naz’ras has jagged stars carved into his back from that incident, still, and his heart hurts with memory of his brother, his true brother. Not this crazed child. But Naz’ras kneels down to use his magic to heal the cuts; that is a simple enough piece of magic, Healer though it is and Druid though he may be.

“You should wear shoes, Fal- …Fen.”

Fen scowls. It is not nearly as frightening as it could be. “Don’t like shoes. I can’t feel the earth through them. It’s not right. It’s not real, the colors aren’t. I don’t like this rule, Naz.”

“That’s the purpose of shoes… Fen. Follow the rule, please.”

Fen pouts – _Childish and wrong,_ Naz’ras thinks – but nods. “Only for you, Nazzy. Will it make your blues and blacks go away? They’re wrapped around your chest like they belong there, all along the frayed threads.”

 

 

**_**_XVII. They Cannot Fix His Broken Mind_ ** _ **

 

Naz’ras Shaa rages for three days. He has the presence of mind to travel to the Crimson Mountains to do it, where he warps the landscape so completely with his furious destruction that new maps need to be made.

The boy who used to be a hero, for his part, is locked away. They will keep trying, because the world is waiting for Yuusha Fallon to lead them and love them, but Kain and Fror – the most skilled Healers in the world – are not optimistic.

At the end of his three days, Naz’ras Shaa collapses in the scorched earth and screams.

Fallon is dead, and Fen is a mockery of what should have been his rightfully-earned happiness. Fen is a mockery of his sacrifice.

 

 

**_**_XVIII. He Remembers the Not-Quite End_ ** _ **

 

“Naz’ras. There is nothing to do. Zur’s magic invaded Fallon’s, twisted it. When Fallon killed him, it broke his mind. There is only so much we can do, for something as complex as the mind. With how entwined their magics were, during the battle, and their fates as well… Naz’ras, we are not Prophesiers. We do not know what happened, so we do not know how to even begin fixing it without killing him.”

“Unacceptable. _Unacceptable._ You’re the most powerful Healer in the continent. Do not tell me you can’t fix him. He was going to get married to Estrenae. He was going to be happy.”

“I’m sorry, Naz’ras,” said the Grandmaster of the Order of Healers, their trusted officer Fror.

Naz, in reply, clenched and unclenched his left hand, his only hand. His head was a mess.

“I want to see him.” He’d said, then.

Fror had stiffened. Fror knew. “You’re not ready-”

“The hell I’m not.”

“He might not even remember you.”

Naz’ras remembers everything going quiet. Still. “What?”

“Fallon, he can’t remember- he’s like a child, and he can’t remember. There are some things, but- Naz’ras, he didn’t even remember Estrenae. The woman he loved the most in the world, and he didn’t even remember… She couldn’t handle it, she left the city.”

“Let. Me. See. Him.”

Fror sighed. “The city needs you. The people need you. You can’t leave.”

Naz’ras’ icy eyes narrowed into slits. “I’m not Estrenae. I won’t run. Not from my brother.”

“You’ll run from a stranger.” Fror said, then, very quietly and very softly.

“I don’t run.”

Kneeling in the warped Crimson Mountains, Naz’ras Shaa wishes he ran.

 

 

**_**_XIX. He Also Wishes That the Tyrant Weren’t Dead_ ** _ **

 

Naz’ras Shaa does not think he could hate Fehl’kai ac Zur more. His imagination runs away with him, sometimes, with how strongly he longs for this hate to be sated with blood. He imagines the impossibility of Zur having crawled away from the final duel with his life intact. He imagines that what he would do is hunt the filthy tyrant down and tear his stomach out and drown him in the acid. Zur had taken everything from them. Everything.

No. Naz’ras sighs, listening to Fallon – who will answer to nothing but Fen – chatter about caterpillars and strings of fate. Naz’ras hates Zur, but it was not Zur who’d taken everything.

It was the Prophecy.

“It wasn’t enough that it took your freedom and happiness, was it?” he whispers, watching what became of the General he would have died for. “It took your sanity. You will never be happy.”

And neither would he. Naz’ras is, first and foremost, Fallon’s brother. This is a fate worse than death. Why is Fehl’kai ac Zur allowed honorable death, a death in combat, when his brother – who killed himself over and over for this world – is only allowed insanity?

 

 

**_**_XX. They Try to Remake Him_ ** _ **

 

They try another tactic. They try to teach Fen how to utilize Sage magic. They try to teach Fen how to be a Sword Sage. It might bring his memory back. It might bring Fallon back. They are desperate, so they try.

Fen despises it. He is skilled at Sage magic, but there is a distaste on his face that they have not seen since he was a child, first learning how to control his power. Naz’ras Shaa and the Sage Master he brings know that Fen is a regressed, childish version of Fallon, mixed with cryptic nonsense.

Children are innocent. Honest. But they dismiss this, because they need Yuusha Fallon back.

 

 

**_**_XXI. The World is Waiting_ ** _ **

 

Where is the Yuusha? Where is their hero? They all wonder, because only a select few were given his location, hidden with Naz’ras Shaa’s Druid magic. The world believes that the magical injuries Yuusha Fallon suffered – suffers – can be cured. The world doesn’t know that it is permanent, that they have lost him forever.

Naz’ras Shaa wishes it was he who killed Fehl’kai ac Zur, so that he would be insane instead.

But wishes would not save his brother’s mind. He knows this. The world does not, and it cries out for the Yuusha, the beautiful boy with the stars on his back. Naz’ras Shaa’s pocked, marred flesh is an ugly substitute.

 

 

**_**_XXII. The Strings Are Not Reciprocated_ ** _ **

 

“Are you waiting for Naz’ras?” asks Kain, his old smile wise and sad.

They are always sad, Fen thinks. He is sitting on his bed, watching the window. The Sage Master is not here to drive him to exhaustion with things he hates. His strings are like chains, winding like rusted iron from the man’s chest to Fen’s wrist.

There is a string in the middle of his chest, a rich nighttime blue. Not the same blue that is sadness, though. It is tied around Naz’ras’s wrist, wrapped around his left arm snugly. He wishes he could send warmth through it, and tells Kain that he tries, but Naz’ras is always so angry and sad.

Kain replies that some people simply cannot be reached, sometimes.

“Things aren’t reciprocated. Even if you love someone, they don’t always love you back. Or if they do, it’s not always the same way.”

Fen does not realize that Kain is speaking about Estrenae, the woman Fallon would have married. He wouldn’t be able to connect that hysterical, beautiful woman to the name in any case. Her dark green string doesn’t even pulse with love anymore; it crumbles, day by day, disappearing and being forgotten.

Fen thinks Kain is saying this about Naz’ras. “It hurts,” he murmurs to Kain.

“That it does.”

In the end, no one is happy, even if everyone is trying to be.

 

 

**_**_XXIII. He Has Only Protested Once_ ** _ **

 

“I don’t want to stay here, even if Kain has lovely colors. Or he will. He’s going to, one day. Lots of purples. I want to go and explore. How can I be a butterfly if I can’t fly? That’s a silly idea.”

But they do not care what Fen wants. They do not care for Fen at all.

 

 

**_**_XXIV. He Hates an Innocent_ ** _ **

 

And that realization makes Naz’ras Shaa want to vomit.

He enjoys war, he has enough cunning and cruelty and bloodlust to inspire fear; that he was Fallon’s brother was all that stopped the Orders from exiling him after some of his bloodier deeds. But he has never turned his magic on an innocent, has never treated the free people with the savage violence he reserved for Zur’s army. He loves his people.

That he hates Fen makes him still, breath held in frozen lungs. It is horrifying a realization.

And he only realizes it when Fen says to him, “You have two strings on me. One of them is as thin as a hair, see? It’s silver. The other one is growing. It’s black, Dark. Like the Bad Man’s Dark. I don’t like him, much.”

Naz’ras has long connected Fen’s strings to relationships and feelings, and the Bad Man and the Dark to Fehl’kai ac Zur, who was made of hate and greed.

 

 

**_**_XXV. The Moon-Eyed Man Is Confused_ ** _ **

 

Which makes him angry and sad. He doesn’t see that there’s a string around Fen’s wrist, a silver one. He doens’t know that Fen is Fen, and Naz and Naz. And it has always been that way. It’s not now, but it was before. And it will be. Fen knows this.

But Fen knows, too, that people don’t see like he sees. They can’t see the strings. They can’t know what colors they’re supposed to be, and will be, and were before. Naz doesn’t know, Naz is still sad because he thinks Fallon is gone. But Fen isn’t.

It makes him frustrated, because he wants Naz to be happy. Naz is unhappy because he thinks Fallon is unhappy. Naz’ras has always thought of Fallon’s happiness. He does not think of his own, sometimes. Fen isn’t quite sure if he knows how. The Sages don’t teach these things, he’s found, which is probably why Fen doesn’t really care for the Sage Masters at all.

“Maybe he needs to be rolled up in silk, too. Maybe he needs to grow his wings.” Fen says to himself. Fen likes the idea very much. Naz has beautiful wings. Or he will.

He just needs to remember things properly, that’s all. Naz’ras Shaa is so easily distracted.

 

 

**_**_XXVI. They are All Black and Silver and Blue_ ** _ **

 

Those are the colors on Naz’ras Shaa’s head.

Naz’ras touches the flowers woven in a neat part-circlet, resting on his dark curls. His heart is silent – there is no sadness or rage, for once – and it is a strange feeling to him, after so many years of both. Fen grins cheerfully where he stands, rocking on his heels.

Naz’ras Shaa is a Druid, and so he understands that these flowers are clumsy. Infantile. Amateurish. Fallon’s last attempt – years and year ago –was much neater, though the colors are the same.

And that is why he cannot bring himself to stop crying, isn’t it? It’s the same.

“You’re very much like a caterpillar, you know. You need a metamorphosis. But that’s all right, because you’re going to be very beautiful. I’m sure the flowers will welcome you to them.”

Nonsense and wisdom. The nonsense is new, but there is a meaning in Fen’s words that echo Fallon’s quiet, secret sentiments. The ones only Naz’ras was privy to. He wonders if Fallon had always hated his fate to be Yuusha. He wonders if Fallon had always despised his role as a Sage.

He wonders when he forgave them for turning Fen into Yuusha Fallon.

 

 

**_**_XXVII. Brother_ ** _ **

 

Is what he longs to call Fen. Now he realizes, now he knows, that he was grieving all the parts of Fallon that his brother himself despised. His grief had blinded him to all the parts of Fallon that he had wanted to protect.

 

 

**_**_XXVIII. He Says This Before He Changes His Mind_ ** _ **

 

“Go.”

“They’re not going to be happy. You’re breaking their rules, even if I do like that I don’t have to wear shoes anymore.”

The world is waiting for Fallon, when all he had wanted to be was Fen. Naz’ras understands this now. And it angers him, the more he thinks of it, because the world demanded Yuusha Fallon die for them all; and now that Fallon is finally happy – finally, _finally_ – it demands that happiness to die for them all, too.

Naz’ras will not allow it. Fen is the embodiment of Fallon’s happiness, his greatest desire, even if it’s a bit different than Fallon probably imagined it. Now that Naz’ras Shaa realizes this, he will do his brother good – do _himself_ good – and let Fen go.

His brother has needed freedom more than anyone in the world. Even from Naz’ras himself.

“Go, Fen. Travel and follow your trail of caterpillars and- and be happy. No one will recognize you. You’re not tethered by these strings anymore.”

Fen laughs. “The strings aren’t tethers. They’re connections. Chains are bad but strings are softer, see? Like silk. The caterpillar was a moth, did you know? But she’s not ugly. She spun such soft silk and her colors were lovely even so.”

Nas’ras can only smile fondly. “Is the black string gone, at least?”

“Oh, yes. It’s broken now, it’ll leave soon. It’s only the thick, pretty silver one now.”

 

 

**_**_XXIX. Thrice Upon a Time_ ** _ **

 

There is a man. He is born the same year as Yuusha Fallon. He is abandoned by everyone, because there is too much bloodlust in his young, silver eyes. All but one, another orphan, whose masks are sung and true face is unsung.

He is both Druid and Sage, since he doesn’t care for the Rule of One Role. He becomes a king to change that rule, and because – though he is a good man – he loves to spite the Orders for trapping him and his brother in war. He is only allowed the crown because he was once a war general, famed for the blood of Zur’s army that he spilled and bathed in.

They are not beautiful or natural, but there are twelve stars on his back. They are scars, twisted into puckered skin and cracks. But he is not a conventional man, he who loves battle and loathes structure, so he is proud of his scars and proud when he melts the golden crown down.

He wears another crown, one made of flowers that are colored like the nighttime sky and are shaped like the moon. He doesn’t ever remove it. It’s by his side more constantly than anything, preserved and protected with his Druid magic.

His name is Naz’ras Shaa, and he is a Yuusha who thought he would be unsung.

And somewhere in the world, there is a traveling Druid, with golden hair and blue eyes and a penchant for butterflies and strings, that he calls brother.

 

 

**_**_XXX. This is How the Story Goes_ ** _ **

 

There is a string wound all around the Druid’s arm. It nearly covers the frayed black one, which is thinner than a hair now, crumbling and soon to be gone. There is another covering the only arm of Serenvaard’s king. Even though there are strings hanging all over his wrist, it is this string that thrums with warmth and happiness. Sometimes, the strings twist together, and it’s like whispers spoken only by moonlight.

Happiness and freedom flows through both strings, making them warm to the touch, making them pulse with that quiet feeling of home, and their colors are beautiful.

 

The end

 


End file.
